The Stalker
by Jedi Ani Unduli
Summary: Here's my sequel to A Prank Gone... Wrong?. Ahsoka wants attention. Luminara gets some inspiration. Barriss and Anakin hang out. And perhaps this is all an interlude before the next prank...


_Here's my sequel to_ A Prank Gone... Wrong?. _Ahsoka wants_ _attention. Luminara gets some inspiration. And perhaps this is all an interlude before the next prank..._

 _Disclaimer: If only I owned these characters. I'd treat 'em ten times better than that_ cunt _Kathleen Kennedy..._

She felt a set of eyes boring persistently through her forehead. She refused to acquiesce by opening her eyes. Why should she? Due to the lull in the war, both the Jedi Council and the Republic had allowed them some rest and relaxation time. She had chosen to use it to catch up on some much needed sleep. Her stalker, on the other hand, had different plans. Apparently, interrupting a Jedi Master's sleep was a much more important task.

"I believe there are other, more stimulating opportunities that you would enjoy to partake in."

"No."

"Perhaps there are reports you need to finish?"

"Did 'em."

"Some training modules you haven't completed?"

"Completed 'em." She sighed.

"What about Barriss?"

"Talking with Skyguy." _That_ was enough cause for her to open an eye. Ahsoka shrugged at her dubious glance. "I dunno what for, probably catching up. When I saw both of them talking, she made shooing motions for me to go away." _That_ caused her other eye to open.

"You mean you can actually take a hint?" The girl's montrals darkened.

"I can! I mean, we're friends after all." Luminara, deciding she wasn't going to get any sleep given the direction this conversation was heading, chose to sit up off her bunk. Ahsoka obligingly gave her room to move, but still chose to remain seated on the bunk. "Besides, I figured you might be available to go do something." Luminara's lips twitched upwards into barely a smile.

"I think you mean a better target." Ahsoka glanced at her, and Luminara looked back at her. She apparently saw the smile, because the tension went from her shoulders.

"Well, I figured we probably shouldn't humiliate you any more," the young one said, a smile of her own coming on to her face.

"No," Luminara agreed. "I believe you did enough of that a couple nights ago."

"Hey! It was a serious bet. I could've lost big time!"

"So seeing Master Skywalker and myself practically naked was worth your punishment?"

"Well…" Luminara sighed.

" _Don't_ tell me Anakin didn't punish you."

"Oh no, he did," Ahsoka assured her. Luminara then saw a spark of something she didn't like appear in the girl's eye. "Hey, you just called Skyguy by his _first_ name."

"So?" This wouldn't end well for her unless she diverted it, quick. " _You_ told me to relax more around the Jedi I know."

"Sure, but it was a pretty _quick_ change…"

"Ahsoka, perhaps you're better off thinking of what you'd like to do." The padawan huffed but acquiesced.

"Well, _whatever_. I just want to do _something_."

"I could give you homework." That was a half threat on her part. If she were to give Ahsoka homework, _she'd_ have to grade it. A proper Jedi Master she may be, but this was one time she intended to not sacrifice her free time for learning. Period. Judging by the smile on the young one's face, she gathered that Ahsoka knew that.

"Maybe… we could do something," Ahsoka tentatively suggested. Luminara considered that. Ahsoka was coming to bother her more and more often, whether in person or over the comms. It was… interesting. Perhaps it was the lack of girl time with Skywalker (for obvious reasons), Rex was busy (she wasn't as blind as the padawans thought she was), or maybe she truly was bored. Regardless, spending time with someone who was younger and more exuberant than she was fun. _Never_ tell that to Ahsoka though.

"Well," she said, a thought dawning on her. "I could teach you a technique." She caught Ahsoka wrinkling her nose.

"Is it for fighting?"

"Why the distaste? I thought you liked fighting."

"Yeah, but Skyguy and I already _did_ that," Ahsoka grumbled. Luminara knew her well enough to not take offense.

"No, it's not for fighting." Ahsoka perked up again. "This is a technique purely for fun." Ahsoka turned to face her, one eyebrow raised high in skepticism.

"You? Fun?" Luminara rolled her eyes in response.

"Let's head down to the training rooms, Ahsoka." The padawan practically shot out of the room. _With all that energy, she could probably send our fleet to Coruscant and back again_ , Luminara thought wryly.

* * *

Down in the training rooms, Ahsoka was pacing back and forth impatiently. She had chosen her room well. There were objects here that she could use, if not the sand pit used for wrestling then perhaps the weights. Sand pit would be her first and best option, however.

"So, what are we going to be doing?" She turned to see Ahsoka bouncing back and forth on her heels again.

"Has your master told you about a mission he went on to Ansion?" Luminara inquired.

"Oh?" Ahsoka looked thoughtful for a moment. "I think so. That was where you and he and Obi-Wan and Barriss were to stop Separatist involvement, right?"

"Right. What else did he tell you?" Ahsoka shrugged.

"I don't remember. I don't think he said much more of anything about it. He doesn't really talk much about things he went through." That was interesting to Luminara; why would he not tell her at least about Ansion? There was enough there to supply funny stories for at least a month.

"Well, when we were on Ansion," she began, "we had to go out from the city to search for the Alwari in order to convince them that they needed to go to the city to make peace with the city-dwellers. They are nomadic, separated into clans and spread across the plains, and it took a while to find the Borokii overclan. We stumbled across the Yiwa, first, and although they knew where to direct us in our search, we had to prove ourselves to them first."

"How did you do that?" Ahsoka asked.

"They wanted us to demonstrate that we had 'inner essence,' so to speak. Barriss performed an excellent display combining acrobatics with her lightsaber, Obi-Wan told a story, and your master sang a Tatooine ballad." Ahsoka's eyes grew wider with astonishment.

"Skyguy _sings_?!" she half asked, more gasped. Luminara coughed to hide her equally amused chuckle.

"Yes, and trust me, he sang _very_ well. The elders said that any one of our talents we showed had been enough to convince them." Ahsoka then shot her a puzzled look.

"But what did you do, Luminara?" Luminara leaned forward, and she felt the smile spreading over her own face. Doing this technique made her feel like a youngling again, excited and thrilled. Ahsoka seemed to catch a bit of her excitement as well, a grin spreading over her face as well.

" _That's_ what I'm going to show you." She walked over to the sand pit, and casting her eye about she gauged it was going to be a bit small for her needs. Reaching out with the Force, she raised up a steady stream of sand that arched up over her and Ahsoka's heads to feed onto the mats next to them. Once she deemed she had enough, she cut off the source, and the last grains of sand settled onto the pile. Ahsoka looked puzzled.

"Uh, Luminara, is that it?" she asked. Luminara shook her head.

"No, Ahsoka. I just wanted to make sure you and I had enough space to work in. _This_ is what I wanted to show you." Bending at the knees, she reached forward to take some sand into her fist. She then released it slowly. As each grain of sand fell down, she concentrated on each one – the weight, the shape – and she did that for every single grain. She had discovered this technique on her own, quite on accident one day a long time ago. It never ceased to stop beings in their tracks when she did perform it, though. Once she had what she needed, she knew she could begin. Her eyes were open but not fully seeing as she directed the first stream of sand upwards. The Force was all she needed at this point.

Ahsoka's gasp was when she knew that the padawan had grasped what she was doing.

Layer upon layer of sand was lifted up as Luminara directed every layer where she wanted it. Once she felt she had enough sand, she stopped taking but kept moving the sand. The sand particles swirled around her on the outside, from head to toe they moved and reflected the light from the ceiling. She had them duck and weave, the upper half moving clockwise, the lower half counterclockwise.

Now came the hard part.

She aptly divided her attention so she could begin to lift herself off the ground. The sand still swirled around her as before; it would be easier to do a direction change once floating off the ground. Once she was about a foot off of the ground, she began to spin herself slowly, gaining more momentum as she continued to turn within the still-swirling sand. As she reached the speed she wanted to maintain, she began to tilt herself within as she switched the direction between the top and the bottom so now the top went counter-clockwise, and the bottom clockwise.

Her eyes closed as she immersed herself in the fullness of this experience.

* * *

Anakin and Barriss had been talking for quite some time before they realized just how much had passed them by. She had suggested to Anakin that they find Ahsoka and Luminara and do something between all four of them, and Anakin had agreed. Sensing that they were in the training area, they walked on down, still catching up on news and past missions they had been on. They had been friends since Ansion, and despite Anakin's promotion to Jedi Knight Barriss was still determined to be friends with him. She still saw him as the odd Jedi out, the one who never quite fit in. When he accepted her friendship on Ansion, she had been surprised but pleased. She wanted him to know that she was intent on maintaining that tie, and so far he seemed to be of the same opinion. That, and Ahsoka liked hanging with her too.

They reached the viewing walkway above the last set of training rooms, having passed by and checked the others. Barriss suddenly saw something in the second window and hurried over to look down, Anakin hot on her heels.

Luminara was performing her sand-spinning routine from Ansion. Barriss had seen her do it before, of course, but that had to have been the first time Luminara had done it before nonForce-sensitive strangers. Ahsoka looked positively transfixed by the sight, a smile hanging off of her lips. Barriss smiled and was going to say something to Anakin when the words died on her lips.

The look on his face was peculiar. It was similar to Ahsoka's look of pure enjoyment down below; however, there was something different about it. There was an element of Anakin's focused attention to it, especially when he was learning something. She remembered the look on his face when he first saw her master do the act on Ansion; there was a hint of that too. For whatever reason, however, she felt that there was something else, something she was missing.

"Hey. Anakin," she gently nudged him. "You there?"

"Hm?" His eyes still weren't wavering from Luminara's rotating figure.

"You want to head down there?" Barriss asked. "I'm sure Luminara would enjoy teaching you how to do the technique." He turned to glance at her, then without giving an answer turned back to continue to gaze at the spectacle below. "Anakin?" This was confusing. Anakin rarely was without words to say. "Well, uh –"

"How does she do it?" That was kind of an answer, but kind of not. She had to stand there, shrug, and ask, "What do you mean?" to that out-of-nowhere question.

"How does Luminara still manage to maintain her center and be at peace even in the middle of the war?" He gestured down there at Luminara's still-rotating form. "Obi-Wan is also pretty good at maintaining it, despite all the crap we've been through. But she…" he paused, obviously grasping for what to say. Barriss tried to assist him.

"She's able to maintain her tranquility," she said softly, trying to gauge his reaction. "And perhaps you envy that." Of course, that was when his shields went back into place, and his face became inscrutable.

"Yeah, let's head down there," he answered her second question. She rolled her eyes. Typical Anakin – so hard to work with.

"Anakin," she searched for the words as they headed down the stairs. "The war is hard on everyone, and you know I know how hard it is to talk to your own master about these issues. Just know if you ever feel like you need to talk to Luminara, I'm okay with that." As he opened his mouth to say something, the door to the training room opened at the bottom, and Ahsoka was there waving at them.

"Hi guys!" she said cheerily. "Luminara is finishing up her demonstration, and she'll be teaching me how to do this too!" She beckoned them towards her. "Come on! Skyguy, you too!" she added sternly when Anakin appeared to want to protest. He shut up and followed both padawans into the room. Luminara raised an eyebrow at Anakin's presence, but her smile never left her face.

"I didn't know you were interested in learning this technique, Anakin," she said.

"What?" he acted shocked. "Didn't I seem interested enough back on Ansion?"

"You seemed more interested in _watching_ me do it," she retorted. "Just like now."

"Hm, well fair's fair." He had a smirk on his face, and Barriss saw Ahsoka suddenly appear apprehensive. "You were obviously _appreciating_ my good looks the other night." To Luminara's credit, she smirked back, not flustered at all.

"Oh, like I didn't catch you sneaking peeks at me?" she retorted.

"I had to make sure I was getting more droids than you," he deadpanned.

"I'm sure. As long as you made sure Ahsoka got her punishment."

"Did Barriss?"

"I think you know the answer."

"Of course. Fair is fair."

"Indeed." She gestured to the mats all around her. "We have enough space for you too, Anakin. Shall we get started?"

"I suppose. It's always more fun to _participate_ , after all," he winked, taking his place on the mat. Barriss leaned in close to murmur to Ahsoka, "Are you _sure_ there's nothing going on between them?"

"…"

"I thought so." Ahsoka heaved a sigh.

"Well, even if there is, that means we get to spend more time together!" she said brightly. "At the very least, we need to plan our next prank." Barriss took her turn to sigh.

"Don't you ever stop?" Ahsoka winked at her. "You're just like Anakin, you know that?" The only response she got was a laugh. The padawans took their places on the mats, ready to learn this new technique – and possibly plan their next prank on their much-more-interesting masters.


End file.
